UVic Math Colloquium: Joel Hass

A technique for efficiently describing surfaces was developed to solve the knot recognition problem. This method, using “normal surfaces”, was introduced by Kneser and applied to topological algorithms by Haken. In this talk we will show how normal surfaces can be used to solve a key problem in computer graphics:  How to triangulate a surface so that no triangle has an angle that is close to zero. This is joint work with M. Trnkova.